


Night Shines in Lack of Light

by OnlyOneWoman



Series: A Simple Man [11]
Category: Black Sails
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Angst, Canon-Typical Violence, Crack Relationships, Crack Treated Seriously, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Friendship, Genderqueer Character, Hurt/Comfort, I Don't Even Know, I never promised consistancy, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Love, M/M, Mary Read is a guardian, Matelots, Nightmares, Not Canon Compliant, POV Alternating, Past Abuse, Past Character Death, Past Child Abuse, Pirates are bad at feelings, Pirates sticking together, The Author Regrets Everything, The Author Regrets Nothing, This Is Why We Can't Have Nice Things, What I'm doing anymore, at all, because I keep ruining them
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-16
Updated: 2019-11-16
Packaged: 2021-02-07 08:19:43
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,752
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21454918
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OnlyOneWoman/pseuds/OnlyOneWoman
Summary: Ned may have been rescued from the dunegeon, but is there anything left to save...?Title once again stolen, this time from Keep Of Kalessin's "Dark As Moonless Night": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vH4p-SxEiqwAnd of course, this is dedicated to the best crackship supporter ever: the amazing E_A_Phoenix, my pirate queen.
Relationships: Billy Bones/Edward "Ned" Low, Ned Low/Eliza Marble (past)
Series: A Simple Man [11]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1530410
Comments: 4
Kudos: 8





	Night Shines in Lack of Light

**Ned Low**  
_They’re about to board, he’s taking the first long step on the plank to cross over. The hunt is over, now there’s only the prize. He doesn’t care about the riches, or the sea. He feels nothing for the crew having his back, nothing for himself and the men now surrendering don’t know what kind of monsters coming for them. They look scared but still confident, their captain with a pathetic hat screaming of the need for power, for respect commanded, not earned._  
  
_And Ned has blood in his eyes, not yet visible, but from within, coloring his vision when his foot isn’t met with the plank, but air and he’s falling. It’s embarressing and fucking idiotic, he thinks but the water doesn’t come, there’s nothing swallowing him, no gunshots or laughters in his ears, not even the rocking of ways or creaking wood. He’s trying to grab onto something but he’s falling into the emptiness and there’s no steady ground to be seen._  
  
_In front of him, the prize has disappeared and The Fancy no longer has his back. Above is darkness, underneath him, darkness, around him… it’s all black and there’s not enough air, nothing to grab hold of, he’s boundless and that’s when he sees them._  
  
_The braids still brown, like hazelnuts, eyes grey and she’s holding a bundle in her arms._  
  
_“Look, Edward, your father is here …”_  
  
_A small whine comes from her arms and Ned swallows._  
  
_“Eliza? Ye’re… I thought ye… I saw ye an’ the lil’ one…”_  
_“We had to leave you, my love, but we’re not gone. Isn’t he beautiful? He has your eyes.”_  
  
_She holds out the bundle, the son with blue eyes and Ned reaches for it, is too far away and behind the long, cheap skirts of Eliza, a little girl with braids and a simple, brown dress, comes peeking. Ned is shaking._  
  
_“Elizabeth…? Tha’ ye…?”_  
_“When are you coming home, da?”_  
_“I… Lass, I… Ye’ve become so big…”_  
_“Miss you, da. Aunt Rebecca says you’re on a long journey…”_  
  
_He’s crying, he can’t find the words and he still doesn’t reach to touch his family._  
  
_“P-please, come closer, loveys…”_  
  
_Eliza looks at her with longing, with pity, and she bounces their son in her arms. The shawl with blue flowers is tucking him in._  
  
_“We can’t, dear husband. You lost us, remember? Are you still wearing my ring?”_  
_“Always. Yer bonnet… an’ a lock o’ yer hair as well… They’re in my cabin. Please, my lovey, let me hold ye… ”_  
  
_The longing is so strong even with the distance, Ned can almost feel the scent of her hair, touch the bodice’s facbrics and lean against her linen shirt._  
  
_“I miss ye, so much…”_  
_“We miss you too, Ned. I will always love the man you were, but you’re no longer the man I remember… Come, my daughter, it’s time to leave…”_  
_“No!”_  
  
_Ned fights the distance, he’s reaching for the family he lost and they’re all turning their backs to him now and Eliza lets go of Elizabeth’s hand and disappears._  
  
_“Eliza! Eliza, don’ leave me!”_  
_“Da?”_  
  
_Elizabeth is still there, now looking back at him with eyes that are so alike her mother’s, Ned can barely look at them._  
  
_“Da?”_  
_“Aye, lass?”_  
_“Why did ye leave me?”_  
_“I… God, I’m so sorry, my lass. I regret it every day, every night, my sweet, but a life at sea is no place for a young girl. Ye’d get hurt.”_  
_“Then come back, da. Mother an’ little Edward are gone an’ I miss ye. Come back to me, da…”_  
_“I can’t, my lass… I… I never should’ve left ye, but ye should… remember me for who I was…”_  
_“Who are ye now then, da?”_  
  
**Billy Bones**  
The sound reminds him of a badly wounded animal, a wild thing caught in a trap and fully aware there’s no way out, yet still it claws against the cage. A futile, mindless attempt to get free and Billy doesn’t know if he should hold the man or not. If his arms would create yet another cage or become a safe haven. Ned is in so much pain, almost every touch will cause more and Billy just stays on the bed with him, hoping there’s some sort of comfort from the mere presence.  
  
“Be still, beautiful… You’re safe now…”  
  
_Beautiful._  
  
He’d blush if he had enough shame left for it. He doesn’t. The worry, the relief, all the things he’s feeling for Ned Low, for reasons he can’t even begin to grasp, have wiped out shame, composure and the fear of being exposed. How can there be much more exposure than the way he’s treating the feared, feral Captain right now?  
  
Billy finds his lover beautiful. It’s not a given, a lover can be tolerable to the eye and the thing keeping you hooked being his ways in bed. He could be pretty too, and a lousy fuck. There are all variations and Ned fits in none. He’s his own and without fully understanding how, when or why it happened, he’s also Billy’s now. He puts a bottle of absinthe, strong as the Devil’s breath as Mark – or Mary – Read puts it, towards the sore, dry lips.  
  
“Drink some, love. Gonna make it easier for you… You’re safe with me, Ned, I promise…”  
  
Unless the nightmare comes back and it will. For five days and nights, Billy’s brutal and brutalized lover has been slipping in and out of chaotic sleep ridden with nightmares and incoherent bits and pieces from a past Billy has only caught a glimpse of until now.  
  
Mostly, Ned rambles regrets, asking for forgiveness for leaving and at first Billy thinks the Captain directs it to him, but as the same nightmare returns, he realises the unconscious lithanies are meant for this Eliza who was his wife, a son and a daughter and the remorse is almost unbearable to witness. Not because it hurts to be left out these God awful hallucinations, Billy is grateful that Ned is spared that, but because the grief is pouring out of his lover’s every pore and unlike the blood, Billy can’t do anything to stop it from spilling.  
  
His heart is breaking, it truly is, for he’s never heard a self-hatred like this. There’s no forgiveness for Ned, no lenience, no pity at all from the man himself and to not reach through, to hold but not have him, makes Billy fall apart, little by little as the nightmare keeps coming back.  
  
It’s back again, for the second time this evening and it’s not even nightfall yet. Billy hasn’t left his lover’s side more than a few moments since finding him and both Silver and Muldoon have stopped trying to convince him to get out for some fresh air. Read comes every morning and night to check on her Captain, perhaps not fully trusting this crew, and when Billy sees her in the doorway with furrowed eyebrows at the predicament of her Captain, Billy shakes his head.  
  
“Wait a moment, please?”  
“He’s rambling…”  
  
Billy looks up, surprised.  
  
“You’ve not seen it before?”  
  
She shakes her head and Billy sighs.  
  
“He’s having nightmares, Read. It’ll pass.”  
“He’s still in pain.”  
  
She sounds almost accusive, but Billy can hear the genuine care and he appreciates it. The Fancy’s crew have long since abandoned their Captain and maybe for good reasons, but Billy is a pack wolf, not a loner and to have an entire crew not just turn the back against you but completely erase your spot amongst them, is brutal and cold. Not even in his darkest thoughts about Flint, has Billy nursed the idea of simply pretending he doesn’t exist. He looks at his lover again, who’s twisting and turning on the bed, sweat dripping from his body and lips sore from bites. Billy presses the lightest kiss he can manage onto the forehead.  
  
“I’m not leaving you, my love…”  
“Why are you calling him that?”  
  
He’d almost forgotten about the girl and when Billy looks at her, she seems suspicious, arms crossed as she’s leaning against the door frame. She’s a tough one, but also vulnerable. A girl in a world of men, pretending to be a boy and in Billy’s experience, lonely children of any sex are easy prey both in Nassau and the civilized world. It’s strange to see this already experienced, well-disguised and skilled girl express confusion like this.  
  
Billy looks back at Ned again, at the hand where the bones are slowly healing.  
  
“Well… Because I sorta do, I guess. Love him…”  
  
He both is and isn’t surprised of himself, of the words falling quite easily from him. A truth that doesn’t need to be digged for anymore, it’s not really been hidden for a long time and it’s not particularly sweet, there’s no tapestry of poetic words to it and the one who should’ve been the first, the only one perhaps, to hear them, is lost to the world in Billy’s arms.  
  
And Mary/Mark doesn’t ask anything more, her suspicion still there but a bit softened. The world as a whole, for some reason, feels less hard and grey now. No colors yet, but at least it’s not getting darker.  
  
**Ned Low**  
His one seeing eye is unused to the light and he closes it too quickly and the world starts spinning. Before he knows it, he’s retching and weeping. Like an animal. _Like a weak little girl._  
  
“Lovey? Hey, c’mere… Use this.”  
  
A bucket, how practical. But the light is still hurting him and he puts an arm above his eyes.  
  
“Cover…”  
  
He can barely speak, but the giant he should reckognize understands and when the huge arms come around him, closing in his head, careful as if it was made of glass, the bucket steady underneath, Ned’s eye can rest as his stomach lets go of bile and what tastes like blood. That’s when he remembers who the giant is.  
  
“Billy…?”  
“Yeah, it’s me, Ned… I’m here, love…”  
  
_ Love._  
  
Maybe the darkness is a blessing. Ned isn’t sure if he’d bear to look at the giant now. He’s never felt this weak, this… broken before, and that includes when he lost his eye in a knife fight and that time when he was around nine and father almost whipped him to death for stumbling and loosing a purse with coin after a burglary. He was bedridden for a week, mother always close, her hawkeyes keeping father away while Ned’s back and legs burned like had there been actual fire licking the skin.  
  
Darkness truly was a blessing then, hiding the weakness Edward Low senior couldn’t stand.  
  
“It’s alright, lovey. You want water?”  
  
A cup brought to his lips, the hand cupping his head to aid, so gentle. No shame, no anger, only the soothing blue. In the cup, in the eyes. Ned can’t see them, but he knows their color intimately. He shouldn’t, but he does.  
  
He can feel the callous thumb stroking undeneath his eyes and the kiss onto his hair.  
  
“I’ll make a blindfold, my sweet.”  
  
What a world he’s now living in. It’s not the pain that’s new, oh no, Ned sometimes believes he could sense the kicks and punches from father onto mother’s belly while still in her womb. Pain and violence, the red path to the black flag has had but one direction, only deeper into the chaos, riding it, sailing it, crashing onto pointy rocks from it. And now it’s made him completely blind.  
  
An eye for an eye. He’s not sure if it’s a curse or a gift, being blind in a storm of something else than the spikes of rain slapping against your face and the sails. Billy’s hands while binding his eyes are too gentle, the strap of fabrics used being clean and soft over his sore vision. There’s thought into it, not a primal, unreflected reaction.  
  
He’s not being blinded, he’s being cared for and he wants to know why. How it’s possible, what exactly Billy sees in him that makes this softness seem so utterly natural. Who else has felt this, who else has had this man’s hands onto them like this and why? Ned isn’t jealous, it’s not really in his nature because he takes what he wants and he’s never really wanted anyone but Eliza – who wanted him back. But he’s curious, even now, in this barely living state, and when the blessed piece of fabrics has shielded him from the light, he leans onto the man.  
  
He’s not… done this before. Showed a need like this, one he didn’t know he had. Certainly not had someone touch him in this way since being a wee child. That’s a long, long time ago and now he can’t help but tilting towards the chest, letting the hands care a little more.  
  
“Are you alright, love?”  
“Aye…”  
  
That’s a blatant lie and they both know it, but it’s better than before and the darkness is merciful, Ned thinks, a barrier between the one seeing and the one being seen. He’s not sure he’d be able to feel Billy’s eyes right now. He’s still too sore and the man is so, so bright, looking past Ned’s darkness and at the moment maybe it’s for the best that he can’t see at all.  
  
**Billy Bones**  
There were girls in his own age on their street, teasing him sometimes and he’d blush and not really understand why mother and father looked at each other, smiling. They never saw their only son come into manhood, courting some girl with freckles and innocent eyes, getting married and having sons of his own. What would they think if they saw him now?  
  
Billy tries to see his father’s face twisted in disgust, his mother’s in grief and shock, but it’s been so many years since he saw them, the pictures become unreal. He’s not seen them in fifteen years and they could be dead or alive, have another son or daughter, or being on their own. They wouldn’t want to know how their pressganged son turned out. They’d be appalled by the violence, the thefts, the innocent lives falling for his pistol and blade. They’d most likely turn away in disgust, possibly fear, if they saw him be with a man as with a woman.  
  
Ned isn’t the only one who’s an animal, a beast, to the world. It’s all about who you’re compared to and the boy who got pressganged is as lost and dead as the husband who lost his wife. It’s their losses that have shaped them and Billy still doesn’t think he’d choose any different when Flint offered him to kill the man who took him. The Navy captain had not only imprisoned him, but starved and beaten him too. And worse.  
  
Billy swallows and looks down at the barely conscious man in his arms. Some of his wounds are of the kind most men never know about, but _he_ does. The dark, cold nights on the ship were the worst time, even if the gruesome labor was done. His body was utterly exhausted and sometimes he’d barely stay awake long enough to finish his meager rasion. His bunk was, like the other men and boys in forced labour, at the bottom of the ship, uncomfortable and stinking. He was a small boy. Tall, but skinny and the youngest onboard. No women or girls were allowed.  
  
Boys, how ever, were.  
  
Some nights he was too knackered to care. When he’d gotten used to the unwelcome invitations to the Captain’s cabin and he’d learned to focus on the extra rasion of rum his skinny body used to ease the pain and muddle the memory. To let the sound of the waves drown the Captain’s grunts and his own whimpers.  
  
When Billy finds the one responsible for this, he’ll make sure the name _Bones _remains in people’s memories for a very long time. Right now it doesn’t matter that the guards on post are already slaughtered, or if they were the ones doing this or not, because this must be paid for in blood. William Manderly will never understand this, because unlike Ned, he died a slow death and in his place is a man who will do what’s right, not according to the world, but to his heart. The faces from his past, no matter how loved and missed, will frown and turn away, but they’re shadows now and the man tucked to his chest is of flesh and blood.  
  
He’s Billy’s flesh and blood now. Billy doesn’t know how or when that happened, but it’s a truth his own actions confirm. He knows little about love, but the way Ned makes his heart flutter and raise to the skies, as well as sinking deep into unknown depths, is something that’s never been a part of Billy’s love for his parents or his crew. It holds lust, yes, but there’s more than that. It’s a state of shock, really, but also a slow burn, a longing that has grown larger with time and given room for more than the carnal pleasure.  
  
There’s always the risk that Ned, after this, will never tolerate to be loved or touched by Billy as before, but that doesn’t change what Billy feels for him. He loves Ned. Not the myth, not the Captain, not even the body, but the man unravelling during their time together. And that’s what Billy prays for, even if he’s fairly certain God wont listen, that the hidden piece of humanity, of a heart buried so deep into grief the sound of it was all but muted, will remain.  
  
**Ned Low**  
The sun is set and despite the blindfold and window shutters, it’s still a relief. Ned has been sleeping for a rather long time and he wakes up in Billy’s arms. He’s sore and dirty and moving hurts like hell. Billy stills his hand.  
  
“Careful, love… You awake?”  
“Think so…”  
  
His voice is thick and dry, the pain is awful but it’s not like stabs anymore. Still, he feels so horribly weak, like his body truly has turned to fragile crystal that will shatter if dropped. He can smell himself too and it’s like pulling the scent of something rotten into the lungs. When he’s starting to retch from it, Billy holds the bucket close but there’s nothing to throw up.  
  
“Air…”  
“What?”  
“Air… I need… _air…_”  
“Lovey, I can’t carry you, you’ll…”  
“Air! _Now._”  
  
Ned has long since lost record of time and the only thing he knows of his current location, is that it’s not at sea and not in town. The lacking sound of waves and people tell as much. The humid air in the house where he’s stored, is reeking from sickness, extrements, body odours and blood. It’s making his blood boil in the wrong kind of way, his throat and nose wanting to cut off the air instead of inhaling it.  
  
When Billy lifts him, Ned cries out and the man lowers again, which just makes it worse.  
  
“_Don’t_… I need fucking… _air_, dammit…”  
  
Finally his lover understands and while being carried is almost unbearable, it’s all worth it once the door opens and there’s fresh air onto his face for the first time in many days and nights. It’s one of the clear nights too, he can feel it. There’s silence and the air fresh and cool, the only sounds being the softness of wind in treas and Ned smiles, at least it feels like he does.  
  
“Billy?”  
“Yes, Ned?”  
“Is… is there a place out here where ye can put me? Til’ morning? Cannae stand the smell o’ me inside…”  
“There’s grass here. Looks soft enough…”  
  
It sounds as if the giant is thinking of something and he stands still.  
  
“I… I can clean you some out here, if… if you allow it?”  
  
Ned swallows. He needs water, inside and outside. He’s sick of the smell, of the stickiness and just general sense of being back in the gutter. The streets of London with the rotten food and the rats, the piss and the sickness. People with poxes, purulent wounds and angry rashes. The need for cleanliness, for fresh air and a bearable scent is greater than the shame and pain now.  
  
He’s a little breathless after being carried, after the sudden feeling of air and he nods slowly.  
  
“Aye. Scrub me off… please? Feel like I’m… rottening…”  
**  
Billy Bones**  
It’s a blessing, being out in the night with his lover. He’s made a bed of grass and a clean sheet and once again he just cuts Ned’s shirt off. There are more to get and the linen wraps around his torso need to be changed anyway. Laying naked in the cool air has Ned shiver some, but his face looks far more at ease already and no wonder. Billy has been too focused on his lover’s condition to really give himself much time to feel how bad the air inside had become.  
  
He’s brought out both warm and cool water, soap and clean rags and towels along with new clothes. Blessed Read for thinking of everything. She deserves a reward for this, truly, not least for the opium. Billy lits a pipe and helps Ned to sit in his arms, soothing him the best he can.  
  
“S’getting better soon, my lovey, just take this… A few moments only, Ned…”  
  
Opium is too much of a mist for Billy. He’s tried it a few times but he prefers to have a clear head. Ned, however, will need it now and he accepts the pipe with ease. They sit like that for a while, waiting for the opium to work it’s magic and to get used to the clear air. Billy feels like he could drink it.  
  
When Ned’s breaths turn slower, more relaxed and even, Billy puts him to the side on the sheet again. He washes his hands first, then drenches a cloth in cool water and starts cleaning the wreckage of a human body. Being quite small and lithe to begin with, the captivity and the time in bed hasn’t been kind to a body used to more or less constant movement. Like a wild animal in captivity with no room to move and nothing to eat, Ned has become bony in several places, the still healing ribs prominent as are the hip- and collarbones.  
  
Billy can’t help but thinking of when he first came to Flint’s crew and Randall, who still had his wits, was the first one to call him Billy Bones, due to his starved frame. The cook gave him extra rasions, a thing unheard of on the ship where Billy had been kept, but pirates took care of their own, Mr. Gates explained, and especially if you were ill. The name Bones stuck even as Billy grew stronger and eventually becoming the tallest and burliest man on _The Walrus_ and it somehow still felt fitting. Cracking them on others became his thing as Randall’s food added meat on his own.  
  
Ned is a lithe man, height around Silver’s, but he’s not as burly, muscles and sinews bearing traces of more years at sea with too small rasions and too hard labour. There’s a lack of care to his lover’s body, Billy thinks. A willful ignorance, almost denial, of not just pain but the causes to it one might need to observe. But if you already feel dead inside, maybe you just… stop care.  
  
Ned whimpers some during the washing but it’s all worth it in the end, as the man lays naked but all clean in the grass, no longer smelling of death and gore. His breathing is lighter and when Billy wraps the clean sheet around him, there’s a hint of a smile before the eyelids get heavier and the opium takes his lover out again.  
  
**Ned Low**  
The nightmare doesn’t return with sleep this time. Maybe there’s just not enough room for it, with Billy’s arms as a barricade. There’s never been anything this prominent between Ned and the red lashes before. No veil remaining for more than a short moment. In the end, it’s always been ripped away, by a hand, a word, a glare or a violent strike.  
  
He’s never worried about nightmares because being awake always hurt more so this is new. To feel the comfort while awake, not the other way around – and then feel it following him back to sleep. The gentleness, the care… Giant hands carrying him like nothing, cradling his usuless wreck of a carcass like a thing of worth and not a pile of shite. He’s the barricade, the soothing blue cutting the red lashes off, holding them back for reasons Ned can’t look into. They remind him too much of what he felt for the girl with long, brown braids and smiling eyes. Of things he lost and no longer deserves.  
  
He makes a small sound and there are lips brushing his ear.  
  
“You need anything, love?”  
“Don’… Ye shouldna…”  
“Shouldn’t what, my sweet?”  
  
He’s not sweet, he’s not something to love. Ned feels tears now and he wants his tears back, dammit. They’re not his to spill, not anymore, he’s forfeited that right for all the tears he never cared about while raiding a ship.  
  
“I… I don’t deserve…”  
  
There’s a lash of pain again, not as red as in the past but enough to cut his breath and Billy holds him through it, helps him to keep the chest open and the air to find it’s way back to his lungs.  
  
“You don’t deserve _this_, Ned. I know who you are, I know what you’re famous for and that there’s enough truth in it for people to have every reason to fear you. But that goes for me as well, and I’ve been with Flint for a long, long time. Far longer than you’ve been at sea, love.”  
  
The huge hands are protective, the low voice soothing and the words seem to come so natural. Ned’s never had a way with words, he can barely read and write, and what little he can has he learned while at sea. Billy knows them, knows the sweet ones that Ned should’ve had for Eliza but hadn’t and he blinks tears away, no longer really caring about them as long as no one but Billy sees them.  
  
He sighs and looks for the words he does know. The ones not of love or sweetness, but of the ugly kind of truths.  
  
“I… I don’ remember who they were… Or why they mistook me for someone who’d… kill women…”  
”They accused you of that?”  
”Aye. He… the one who… He was insane… ”  
  
Ned laughs. Isn’t this a case of the pot calling the kettle black?  
  
“He thought I’d killed his woman… Rebecca or something… I don’ kill women…”  
“I know. We know that as well as we know you cut out and fried a boy’s tongue and forced him to eat it.”  
“Hearsay… It was man, not a boy.”  
“Does it matter if it was a man?”  
“Of course it does. Boys are… not all vile an’ vicious yet… Men, however…”  
“I’m a man.”  
“Never said there weren’t… exceptions. Never promised… to make sense.”  
  
To that, there’s a snort, not dismissive but rather fondly if also incredulous and Ned is pulled closer, face onto the chest where there’s a real heart and not just the memory of one.  
  
“You loved her, she loved you…”  
  
Ned swallows, can’t answer but the silence isn’t hostile and the heartbeats against his ear aren’t dead throbs of a mechanical thing, but alive and pulsating with blood.  
  
“I don’t know the right words, Ned, I’m not sure of the exact… definitions of this but… To the best of my knowledge, I know that I’ve never felt for anyone what I feel for you.”  
  
There’s a deep breath and Ned opens his sore eyes in the darkness, catching the dark blue ones above him.  
  
“I love you, Ned. Simple as that.”  
  
There’s no sun yet, only the spots of light in dark eyes. No daggers of pain through the blindfold, just a caressing blue not dragging him down to the depths, but softly carrying what’s left of him to calm waters. And the drum is gone. Ned’s heart is beating again. Slow and unsteady, but it is, always was, there.


End file.
